Disclaimer: If I owned Harry Potter I wouldn't be posting on Potter and the Refraction of Light
Chapter 3: Alucard
"Ah yes, on to business." Astus's velvety voice intoned "Well, I work alone so I will be leaving when Almus returns." Orion nodded in agreement "Don't get me wrong, I'm sure this Nocens guy is evil and all, but I have my own Dark Lord to vanquish. I don't have time to save the rest of the world, not when my loved ones are in danger." Brian shook his head "If what Almus says is true, then Nocens might have abducted the Voldemorts from any of our dimensions in which case, you will have nothing to fight when you return. I fear Almus may be right, if this Nocens is powerful enough to make Tom subservient, then I fear that none of us alone could stop him." Harry spoke up looking around the room "I may not have the incredible powers you do as my Voldemort apparently stole them from me when I was a baby, but I for one am going to stay and do everything I can to help." Casper nodded his head in agreement "I can't defeat Tom on my own, but I am going to do all I can to help defeat this threat to all our worlds." Brian smiled at Casper and Harry "I don't believe the three of us can do it without you two. Almus said that it would take all of us together and I for one believe him. I don't think Ginny, Ron, and Hermione would be too pleased with any of us if we didn't do everything we could to save reality simply because we wanted to keep them safe." Orion, much to his chagrin was starting to agree, he sighed. "Fine, I'll stay. I think you're right, you guys are hopeless without me." Astus looked around the room at each of his look alikes "It would be a shame if the Dark Lord from my world were summoned without me here to destroy him."
Almus chose this moment to enter the living room "Good, it seems you all have made the right decision, not that I could have returned you to your homes at the time being." Orion stood up indignantly "You couldn't send us back! Why not? You certainly got us here pretty easily!" Almus turned to look at him "Would you believe I was about 18 this morning? Pulling from other dimensions isn't simply a matter of power, it takes sacrifice. I've given up ninety years from my life to bring you six here. Now come on, let me show you to your rooms." Almus walked towards a set of stairs and without looking back walked up them. The five Harry Potter incarnates followed the old man up the stairs to a fairly bland looking hallway with six identical alternating doors.
Almus turned to face the young men assembled behind him "The rooms are charmed much like the room of requirement and will conform to any and all of your needs. All you have to do is enter a room and it will be keyed to your magical signature."
Orion, who was standing in front of the first door on the left attempted to open the door only to find it locked. "Hey! What's the deal?" Brian stepped over to the first door on the right and opened it; he smiled benignly, "It would appear that the door you attempted to open has already been taken." Orion grumbled and walked down the hall to another door which opened for him. Astus chose the door farthest from the stairs leaving Casper and Harry with Almus. Casper spoke up, "Almus, we don't have magical signatures, I'm dead and Harry is a squib." Almus shook his head looking at Casper and Harry, "Of course you have a magical signature! Everyone does, even muggles have magical signatures. There are just so many of them and they're all so faint that no one bothers to record them. Go and try a door." The ghost boy and squib walked to the remaining two doors, Harry touched the door knob while Casper attempted to float through. There was a soft click as both doors unlocked and swung open. Almus smiled and walked down the stairs, leaving the boys to get settled into their new rooms.
A few hours later found the group seated around a large dinning room table immersed in a sumptuous meal. Harry looked at Almus, "This food is wonderful! Where did you learn to cook?" Almus smiled, "I learned from the best, why Mrs. Weasley, of course!" At that moment Astus touched his wand and looked towards a doorway leading from the dinning room into a hallway. "Why is there a vampire in this house?"
"Because, I was called here, just as you were." In the doorway stood a very pale looking Harry Potter, he wore no glasses and his once vibrant green eyes seemed to have lost most of their spark. Orion threw his hands up in exasperation, "Great, I'm a bloody vampire too!" The new undead Harry shot a glare towards Orion before looking around the room, "Do you remember that attack the day we were supposed to leave the Burrow for the wedding, well I managed to kill most of the vampires but one of them caught me off guard. Of course because of the prophecy he couldn't drain me, left me for dead. I guess in some respects I was. I woke up a week later in Grimmuald Place. I nearly killed Remus with my blood lust, it's just lucky that lycanthropy and vampirism don't mix or he would have been doubly screwed. As it was, he was just a little light headed. I almost drained him that day, but we were lucky." He looked around the room to see how everyone had taken his story, Astus showed no emotion, Brian looked saddened by what had become of this new Harry, Casper had an understanding look on his face having died, Harry looked bewildered as he was more or less a muggle, and Orion was sulking at the apparent disservice all the different versions of himself had done to him.
"As far as my powers go, well I too discovered Gryffindor's sword for what it truly was and as fate would have it managed to keep enough magic to continue to wield the blade. My physical abilities have all been heightened far beyond anyone other wizard. I can also do some magic though I no longer need a wand, in fact, the wand makes it more difficult to cast the few spells I can manage. Most of these spells happen to be different forms of the killing curse as death has become a large part of my nature. I'm also able to go outside in sunlight, though it is somewhat uncomfortable if I'm not covered up. We think this is because I couldn't die at the hands of anyone other than the Dark Lord and as such the sunlight cannot kill me." He shrugged and sat down, "That's my life story. I guess for the sake of confusion you can call me Alucard."
Orion had sat with a stony look on his face for most of the tale but perked up slightly at the mention of his sword. "You said basically that you were on the same path as me, I don't suppose you'd like to spar a little bit, would you?" Alucard shook his head almost disdainfully "There's no way you could possibly match my strength and speed. You'd be knocked out before we could have a proper match." Orion pushed his chair out from under the table and stood up, he made the motion of drawing his sword and it appeared in all its flaming glory. "Is that so! I think you're just afraid to lose to the obviously more skilled version of yourself!"
Alucard sighed eyeing the sword; he shrugged in a manner that clearly said it's your funeral and left the room motioning for everyone to follow. He led the group through the living room and through a door where the coat closet should have been. Instead it found them in an enormous gym-like facility with weights, treadmills, and a circular arena. Along one of the walls was an impressive selection of weapons both wooden and metal, from shields to broadswords. Alucard walked to the center of the arena and removed the long sleeved black shirt he wearing to reveal an impressively pale and muscular body, there were bite marks on both of his biceps. "You want to fight me, Orion? Fine, then choose your weapon, lets get this over with."
Author's Note: I must be the biggest hypocrite ever to complain about other people taking forever to update. I'm sorry but I can't say it won't happen again because I don't know if it will or not. I love writing but sometimes I just don't have the inspiration or time or I'm just really lazy. I apologize to the few people who read this the first time but I'm going to try to get more chapters out with more regularity.